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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2001 Week 6 Hansard (15 June) . . Page.. 1860 ..
MR BERRY: This is today's question:
Minister, section 253 (a) of the Land (Planning and Environment) Act 1991 provides for the revocation of an approval if ... is satisfied that the approval was obtained by fraud or misrepresentation. Will the minister confirm that this is the section under which he was advised by PALM that he might revoke the approval of the Lyneham tennis centre redevelopment? Will he table any such advice ...?
That is a quite different question. I do not know whether we got to the supplementary.
Mr Humphries: No, we didn't.
MR BERRY: We didn't. Okay. So, will the minister table any advice from PALM? Mr Speaker, two entirely different questions. That is why we want to suspend the standing orders in order to move a motion dissenting from your ruling in relation to those matters.
Mr Speaker, may I also add to that. This general question needs to be discussed. I know Mr Moore would rather us genuflect and sing in chorus praises of him. You know, "All might to Michael". Mr Speaker, standing order 118 says:
The answer to a question without notice:
(a) shall be concise and confined to the subject matter of the question; and
(b) shall not debate the subject to which this question refers ...
The last time this Assembly went into turmoil in question time was for the very same reasons-that we are not getting the answers to our questions and the government is playing games. I think, Mr Speaker, that we are entitled to debate whether we have confidence in your rulings on these matters when these sorts of things occur. We see that your rulings, quite frankly, are not consistent with the questions that were asked in this place. Mr Speaker, I urge members to suspend standing orders in order that we can have a debate about this issue.
MR HUMPHRIES (Chief Minister, Minister for Community Affairs and Treasurer) (2.59): Mr Speaker, beneath the many words which Mr Berry has just spoken there are a few words I would like to draw attention to. Again it is personal, isn't it. This personal invective is a good substitute for argument.
Mr Berry: No, no, Gary. We are being Gary-ed again.
MR HUMPHRIES: Yes, that's right. Mr Corbell asked:
... will the minister table any legal advice he has obtained in relation to revoking the calling in of this development approval?
That is perfectly clear. Will he table any legal advice? The minister answered a page or so later, in fact two pages later, because almost the whole of those two pages were interjections from Mr Corbell, Mr Berry and Mr Stanhope. When he eventually gets to answer the question he says:
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